It would not be a surprise to see a ragged tumbleweed guided by a bored breeze cross the empty Allan Hancock College parking lots on a Friday afternoon. But starting Oct. 3, the tumbleweed is going to have some obstacles—booths and lots of them.
This semester Hancock’s entrepreneurial and business students are going to be holding an artisan market on the first Friday of the month from 4 to 7 p.m. for the 2014-2015 school year.
Over the summer, six interns mentored by Anne Cremarosa, who teaches business and entrepreneurial classes at Hancock, spent well over their mandatory 60 hours of work hammering away at cost analysis studies prior to chiseling out a business plan for the market.
Aneiscia Esquivias, one of the interns, said it was a fun learning experience.
“Dr. Cremarosa made it fun,” she said. “She made it hard; it was challenging, but it was fun.”
“They came in expecting a regular class where they’d be taking tests,” Cremarosa said of the new students this year.
However, what this year’s students got was a bit more than they bargained for.
With the groundwork laid, current business students are being tasked with running the Friday market business, which will be what they are graded on for this course.
With about 50 vendors scheduled for the first week of the market, students and Cremarosa are optimistic, but also want prospective vendors to know that they have plenty of room in the parking lot.
Aside from giving the community a “good, healthy, fun activity” for Friday nights, getting the community to interact with the college, and giving the business and entrepreneurial students a hands-on learning experience, Cremarosa has higher hopes for the market.
She is banking on the project succeeding in order to keep the opportunity available to current and future business students since grant funding for their program is running out.
“The small business entrepreneurial grant fund ends in December,” Cremarosa said. “The entrepreneurial program is very strong with a lot of students.”
Cremarosa hopes that a successful market will allow them to fund business student scholarships.
While booth prices and fees have not been solidified yet, vendors can expect prices that are “competitive with regional parameters.”
Market attendees will be able to find everything from photographers, jewelers, and potters, to food trucks and all-natural soaps. The market will take place in the parking lot between the Community Education Building (Building C) and Humanities Complex (Building S).
Staff Writer Michael McCone wrote this week’s Biz Spotlight. Information should be sent to the Sun via fax, email, or mail.
This article appears in Oct 2-9, 2014.
